Telenor in Pakistan

Telenor Pakistan is 100% owned by Telenor ASA and adds on to its operations
in Asia together with Thailand, Malaysia and Bangladesh. Telenor acquired the
license for providing GSM services in Pakistan in April 2004, and had launched
its services commercially. Telenor’s investment in Pakistan is the single largest
direct European investment in Pakistan.
By the end of July 2008, the total subscribers of Telenor exceeded 18 million,
with a market share of 23.73% in 2010. Telenor’s network covers more than
3000 cities, towns and highways throughout Pakistan. Furthermore, Telenor
Pakistan has more than 5,000 cell masts throughout Pakistan, making it the 2nd
largest network in Pakistan and 3rd in terms of customer base. Telenor has a
strategic alliance with Nokia Siemens Networks for expansion in Pakistan. With
USD 1 billion already invested, Telenor has extended agreements with its
vendors, including Nokia Siemens for network expansion and services until 2009.
The agreements will result in USD750 million worth of orders from Telenor
Pakistan. The Telenor Group is among the largest mobile operators in the world
with over 165 million mobile subscriptions and a workforce of approximately
40,000. Telenor Pakistan is 100% owned by Telenor ASA and adds on to its
operations in Asia.

Brands in Pakistan
Telenor Group has three major brands in Pakistan:
• Telenor Talkshawk (prepaid)
• Telenor Persona (postpaid)
• Djuice (managed by Telenor International directly)
Telenor Talkshawk is the prepaid mobile connection which is targeted to the
general populace, the general market, of the Pakistan without much
differentiation in the social class or any geographical segmentation as there are
approximately 90 million mobile users in Pakistan. The smartest Prepaid
package to call any network, anytime is the claim of Telenor Talkshawk.
Telenor Persona is a postpaid mobile connection which is targeted towards the
corporate clients. It is, it can be said, not as much commercialized in terms of
advertising as compared to the Talkshawk or the Djuice.
Djuice is a mobile connection that is directly managed by the Telenor
international. It is specifically meant for the youth of Pakistan.
Each brand of Telenor has its different services and packages and there are
different tariff rates for each of them.
Since all the three brands have their own personalities Telenor selects different
advertising strategies for each brand. For instance, the ads of the Talkshawk
connection are far more in number than Persona and the Djuice. Similarly the
ads differ in there content, themes and slogans as well.
Advertising Campaign
As said earlier the advertising methodology for each of the Telenor brands in
Pakistan would differ. It is, however, clear that the basic advertising objective of
the company is to not only attract new customers but also retain the old ones by
informing them with the latest packages company launches from time to time.
There is a lot of competition in the telecom industry in Pakistan, there are giant
players in the market and a minor mistake can result in a huge loss. The
availability to the customers of the services like Mobile Number Portability (MNP)
which allows them to change their connection provider while keeping the same
number has put a serious challenge before the telecommunication firms to be
consistent in maintaining their quality. Whatever the steps are taken by the
companies like Telenor they have to rely on the advertising to stay relevant and
continue to project a good image of their brands.

Advertising Campaign Objectives

Here are the advertising campaign objectives for each of the Telenor brands is
described:

Advertising objectives for Telenor Talkshawk

Talkshawk prepaid connection has been offering four sub packages which are
offering a tariff that would make the call rates less costly. In addition there are
packages that are related to messaging. The objective of Talkshawk adverts is to
stay relevant, retain customers, stay close to the customers, compete with other
companies, increase subscribers by offering them best packages and obviously
increase the company revenues.

Advertising objectives for Telenor Persona

There are less ads being run for Telenor Persona in comparison to the
Talkshawk brand. The reason for this is that the main objective is to keep a
favorable brand image in the eyes of the corporate clients and there is not too
much bombardment of ads. Also the ads are meant to enhance the postpaid
users by offering them innovative services like internet, emailing, etc. It also
wants to retain the customers since the Jazz Indigo is a quite popular postpaid
package among the corporate mobile users. Many of its ads emphasize the
importance of business at the smaller levels like in an ad where the local
business owners see opportunities being created through better connectivity. The
ad is available on the internet. It must also be noted its more business based
ads were running previously but not with much frequency now.

Advertising Objective for Djuice Brand

Djuice is the only telecom brand in Pakistan that has devoted all of its energy on
youth. That’s a mark of distinction for it. It targets youth, and gives them the
slogan, ‘its fun to be young.’ As a very large portion of the Pakistani population
comprise of youth this brand aims to slowly and steadily become the choice of
youth. It has made various ads to target them. Yet one common thing in the
Djuice ads is this currently it is more leaned toward elite youth perhaps because
it believes that targeting elite would automatically become a choice of youth from
all lower stratum of society.

Advertising Budget--Methods Used to Determine

Advertising Budget
The advertising strategy for the Telenor differs for each brand. it is carefully
analyzed which media to be used and which method should be used to
determine the advertising budget. Also it is planned how much of the percentage
of revenue to be spent on the advertising.
Normally the companies use Objective and Task Method for determining
advertising budget. The two popular approaches to decide budgets are Top-
Down and the Bottom-Up approach. In the first the management decides how
much to spend while in the later the activity based and objective oriented
approach is pursued by the managers.
After analyzing the advertising campaigns and budgets it comes to the
knowledge that the Telenor is using the objective oriented approach where the
budget for each brand is decided by the managers depending on the need to
advertise while taking into consideration the market realities.
Currently it is estimated that Telenor was spending over 400 million Pakistani
Rupees annually on advertising. Only in the print media it had allocated
approximately 2.2 % of its revenue for the newspapers advertising. However,
the companies normally spend 10-14 per cent of their revenues on overall
advertising. Thus the figures for overall advertising for Telenor remain to be high
since it uses all the popular media to place its ads.

TARGET AUDIENCE
By Location
The target market is not strictly defined for any of the brands of Telenor specially
the Talkshawk. However, it can be said that the Persona and Djuice are meant to
be more urban oriented. But as it is said earlier the postpaid Persona is now
ready to target the village corporate clients, one should assume that the market
segmentation in terms of location is not aggressively devised and pursued by the
company.

By Demographic
The most important demographic factors that appear in the advertising and
targeting strategy of Telenor is that it is using a mix of certain demographic
factors in some of its brands. For instance there is no demographic segmentation
to sell Talkshawk connection. It is meant to be a smart call package that also
gives certain sms packages and is a countrywide choice operating in nearly all
over Pakistan including Azad Jammu and Kashmir and the Northern Areas of
Pakistan. However, the Djuice differentiates its customers by putting them in the
youth age bracket. It is particularly meant to target the youth. And the Persona is
sometimes targeting the social class, the corporate clients. There is no gender
related segmentation in any of the packages of Telenor.

Message Strategies
For each brand and for a number of adverts for these brands there are different
message strategies are used. This difference, however, is not much seen in the
television and print advertisements. The advertising appeal and the execution
style have been changed in many ads by under each brand.

Advertising Appeal for Talkshawk Ads

The advertising appeal for much of the Talkshawk ads is Informational as well as
Emotional. Some of the ads that were placed at the start of the company
operations were necessarily aimed at increasing the awareness about the
corporate brand and the services being offered to the customers. then
afterwards, after the launching of different brands in the Pakistani market arena
the appeals for the advertisements continues to change. Talkshawk, for instance,
has used many brand ambassadors to make its informational appeals more
attractive and penetrating. Ali Zafar, Amna Haq, Annie are the popular celebrities
that are being used as brand ambassadors by the Talkshawk. The advertising
appeals largely emphasized the package services, tariffs, special offers yet in a
fancy manner. For instance in a recent ad featuring the popular singer Annie who
is accompanied by two of her friends discussing about the Talkshawk package
while visiting a shop and asking for the Talkshawk features, call rates, local and
international, etc. This ad video is available at the BrandSynario web site. In this
ad the information is the major appeal. However, one could say from the
psychological point of view one could say this ad is also producing an emotional
affect by featuring young performers, being happy, purchasing connection, and
then Annie getting hooked toward the guy. This emotional appeal rises the
hidden feelings of the customers to be more related to this brand. Similarly the
other ads of Talkshawk are projecting the same informational and emotional
appeals. But this is not much appreciated because it’s a mere following in the
footsteps of the competitors. There is also very lack of positivism in emotional
appeals of Talkshawk. Rather sometimes Talkshawk as evoke negative emotions
out of oneself since they are not creative and not raising the personality of the
brand.

Advertising Appeal for Persona Ads

The Persona ads too are largely informational, rational and logical. There is also
a huge element of emotional appeal in these brand ads as well. The most ads
are targeted to the corporate clients of these post paid connection users. For
instance in one of the Persona ad a famous TV artist featuring in the ad as a high
profile business CEO lands off from his helicopter and moves toward the office
headquarters for a meeting with his team while applauding the Telenor Persona
as the best connection ensuring best connectivity so essential for the business.
Similarly in another ad about the Persona Edge service a famous model featuring
as an exploration officer takes the attribute approach to tell the qualities of the
Personal Edge package. She tells in the ad that ‘I Can’t wait, I need instant
access.’ while making an analogy of her needs with the Edge features. These
types of ads are quite rational as well as lightly emotional aimed at improving the
brand image. Such ads normally are creative as well as nicely executed and
match the taste of the sensible business oriented clients. All of the Persona ads,
it could be said, are well made, have nice themes, and slogans. They are
professional in outlook. One of the very best Telenor corporate ad is the one in
which there is a flowery trail of communication whose wordings are: ‘Ashkoun
kee lari, Yaadoun kee jhlari, Inn sab ko bhee kaheen Jaana hota hai’

Advertising Appeal for Djuice Ads

The Djuice related ads are too much informational as well as emotional. The
information is depicted to let the youth customers aware of the tariff and the
special services offered by the Djuice. In most of the ads, youth are being the
performers. Most of the Djuice ads are energetic, thrilling and youthful. Yet some
of the Djuice ads are brand building ad. For instance in a very thrilling ad there
are young guys partying and one guy with a girl find hooked in a lift which
displays the youth energy raising powerful emotions in the customers. Also in
another ad, which was recently running in the television channels an
informational appeal is used. This ad, called Djuice Jaagtey Raho, it is simply
told the late night call rates. There are also quite unique themes picked up by
the Djuice yet these themes too are thrilling and energetic. For instance in an ad
a young girl is cooking and meddling with things at kitchen late night while her
eyes have been tied up by a clothing piece. The little ad in the end says, ‘save
your eyes for djuice.’ The ads for the Djuice as already pointed out are more
directed towards the elite audience. Its slogans are even in English like it says,
Djuice, one place…its fun to be young. These English slogans, taking urban elite
youth themes in the ads suggest that the brand is currently trying to make its
image superior while delivering the services as well.

Media Strategy (Electronic Media Only)

Media strategy deals with at which channels to place ads on and during which
programs so that they will be exposed to maximum target audience. The ads
which are good in quality and have the ability to effect the customers can be very
beneficial if there reach is enhanced.
Telenor in Pakistan seems to be following a very sensible media strategy. It
knows at which times it has to place its ads. However, it must be kept in mind
that ads of each are not randomly placed. This timing too is determined carefully.
Talkshawk, for example, places its ads in popular TV Channels during the highly
rated programs. The major channels in which Talkshawk ads appear are Geo,
PTV, AAJ TV, Geo Entertainment, ARY Digital, Geo Super, etc. If we analyze
these channels are ranging from news, entertainment and sports channels. Geo
is a very popular news channel. Most bigger companies want to place their ads
just before the 9 o’clock news at the channel because at this time there are
heavy viewers switching Geo to watch news. That time was occupied by the
Telenor for a certain period of time. The same is the case with the TV programs.
The higher the user rating of a news or entertainment program the more likely
would the companies sponsor these programs and put their ads to be placed
during the commercial break. For instance, the Capital Talk which is a famous
political talk show run on Geo attracts a lot of advertisers. Similarly the dramas
being run on ARY Digital often attract the advertisers. During the cricket season
most companies put ads on Geo Super and other sports channels like Ten
Sports. Telenor Talkshawk is also following the same strategy.
Djuice, however, also targets the music channels, or during the programs which
are popular among youth and the exposure of youth being more visible at certain
times is also a way to place ads for Djuice adverts. Currently Djuice ads are run
on all popular channels including the News channels to keep it relevant.
It must be obviously clear that a brand like Persona can not place its ads on a
cooking channel or a baby channel. Therefore the media strategy for Persona
would be to place ads on channels that are more watched by the business
oriented people. Currently it is seen that the Persona ads were run on the
famous channels like Geo.

CONCLUSION
There is no doubt that Telenor in Pakistan has a great potential. It is the second
largest market occupier in terms of the subscribers while its revenues are also
approximately the second in the industry. Its closest rival currently is Ufone which
is making highly precious adverts by utilizing the theme of humor in them. Ufone
has also been introducing innovative schemes while with the superb advertising
campaign a little changed from the trendy Telenor glamorous, hoopla oriented
and too much irritating sometimes. Certain Telenor ads have nothing to offer but
a painful music, voices and dances and that too often the same thing is repeated
when people get fed up by watching these irksome ads. Yet there are also few
good advertisements by the Telenor. But this inconsistency in advertisements
quality can put it in a great loss since new technology has arrived which allows
the customers to change their connections while sitting at home and facing no
havoc of documentation or other official visit. It is recommended Telenor to
change its strategy for Talkshawk ads and make them more innovative,
appealing and more experimentation with the execution. Similarly the Djuice
needs to change the taste and find ways to target greater youth rather than just
targeting the elite. Persona ads being fine, most of them, but the package need
up gradation in service.